Recently, a large-capacity magnetoresistive random access memory (MRAM) using a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) element has been expected and has attracted attention. In the MTJ element used in the MRAM, one of two ferromagnetic layers sandwiching a tunnel barrier layer is handled as a magnetization-fixed layer (reference layer) which has a magnetizing direction fixed not to be easily varied, and the other is handled as a magnetization free layer (memory layer) which allows a magnetizing direction to be invertible. By associating a parallel state and an antiparallel state of the magnetizing directions of the reference layer and the memory layer with binary numbers “0” and “1”, information can be stored.